The Dow Jones Industrial Average ( ^DJI) is trading up 135 points (+1%) at 13,215 as of Monday, Mar 26, 2012, 10:35 a.m. ET. During this time, 185.8 million shares of the 30 Dow components have changed hands vs. an average daily trading volume of 818.6 million. The NYSE advances/declines ratio sits at 2,334 issues advancing vs. 545 declining with 108 unchanged.

The Dow component leading the way higher looks to be Bank of America Corporation (NYSE: BAC), which is sporting an eight-cent gain (+0.8%) bringing the stock to $9.93. This single gain is lifting the Dow Jones Industrial Average by 0.61 points or roughly accounting for 0.5% of the Dow's overall gain. Volume for Bank of America Corporation currently sits at 87.5 million shares traded vs. an average daily trading volume of 271.9 million shares.

Bank of America Corporation has a market cap of $73.89 billion and is part of the financial sector and banking industry. Shares are up 77.2% year to date as of Friday's close. The stock's dividend yield sits at 0.4%.

Bank of America Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides various banking and financial products and services to individual consumers, small-and middle-market businesses, institutional investors, corporations, and governments in the United States and internationally. The company has a P/E ratio of 30, below the average banking industry P/E ratio of 729 and above the S&P 500 P/E ratio of 17.7.

TheStreet Ratings rates Bank of America Corporation as a hold. The company's strengths can be seen in multiple areas, such as its revenue growth, impressive record of earnings per share growth and compelling growth in net income. However, as a counter to these strengths, we also find weaknesses including generally poor debt management and a generally disappointing performance in the stock itself.

A new study by researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York suggests that bondholders still don't believe the government would ever let the firms collapse into bankruptcy -- after a decade of efforts by regulators to convince them otherwise. But at least one analyst who tracks big Wall Street firms' bonds says there may be an even bigger problem: Investors, pressured by the need to generate income, simply don't care whether the banks are too big to fail -- one way or the other.

Goldman Sachs Group Co-President and former CFO Harvey Schwartz will retire April 20, the company said Monday in a press release. The announcement came just days after the Wall Street Journal reported that CEO Lloyd Blankfein is preparing to step down, possibly later this year.